Apply Today for the fall 2024 semester!
What makes our program unique?
The MA in counseling program strives to achieve the highest standards of training for clinical mental health counselors emphasizing professionalism, counselor identity formation, reflective self-awareness and exploration of spirituality and values in a community environment.
Dedicated, Dynamic Faculty
Our dynamic faculty members are real-world practitioners who are dedicated to mentoring students. Whether collaborating on research endeavors, reading groups, conference presentations and attendance or clinical supervision, faculty members are committed to preparing students to be strong clinicians.
Each student is paired with an advisor, and in addition to regular meetings each semester, each student receives continuous feedback regarding strengths and growing edges.
All faculty are professional counselors, which contributes to an active and engaging conversation about the work of counseling.
Ethical Standards in Counseling
Our students learn about the ethical standards of the counseling profession and the American Counseling Association. Mentors encourage and guide students in the formation of their professional counselor identity, nurturing innate gifts and strengths, while cultivating new skills and the capacity to hold the complexities of the human experience. Ethics workshops are offered during the continuing education series each spring.
Program Features
The Master of Arts in counseling program is a 60 semester hour CACREP-accredited Clinical Mental Health Counseling program designed for people with busy lives. Our students are working individuals who need to balance work or family while returning to school. Some commute from Roanoke, Winchester, Charlottesville and Washington D.C. to participate in our program’s cohort model and experiential training.
The two-day back-to-back course schedule (usually Tuesday/Wednesday or Wednesday/Thursday) during the academic year was designed to accommodate even the busiest schedule.
Program highlights include:
• Practical skills and training
• Emotionally focused therapy (EFT)
• Psychoanalytic perspectives
• Contemplative practice and mindfulness
• Expressive Arts
• Focusing
• CACREP accreditation
• Continuing education (CE) each year for regional clinicians and practitioners
Two degree tracks
• Clinical Mental Health Counseling: a 60-credit, CACREP-accredited track prepares students for clinical practice and meets educational requirements for Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) in the state of Virginia.
• Dual seminary and counseling degree: a dual degree program that helps students earn both the MDiv and an MA in counseling in approximately one year less and at a less expensive cost than if the degrees were pursued separately.
